Utah: “Book About Lesbian Mothers Back on School Library Shelves”

A children’s book about a family with lesbian mothers is back on Davis School District library shelves more than eight months after a committee first decided to restrict access to it.

The district returned the book, In Our Mothers’ House, by Patricia Polacco, to the regular shelves of four school libraries Monday in response to a lawsuit over the issue filed by the American Civil Liberties Union and the ACLU of Utah in November on behalf of a Kaysville parent, said Chris Williams, Davis spokesman.

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Now children may check out the book without parental permission. However, parents may specifically request that the school forbid their child from checking out the book.

“We haven’t taken away the parents’ right to be in the driver’s seat regarding any book that they want their child to read or not read,” Williams said. “We looked at our policy and we asked the question, ‘Is there a less restrictive way we could honor parents’ rights?’ We decided, yes, there is.”

Gary Price (gprice@mediasourceinc.com) is a librarian, writer, consultant, and frequent conference speaker based in the Washington D.C. metro area. Before launching INFOdocket, Price and Shirl Kennedy were the founders and senior editors at ResourceShelf and DocuTicker for 10 years. From 2006-2009 he was Director of Online Information Services at Ask.com, and is currently a contributing editor at Search Engine Land.